Yes, more work on Rampart

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This week readers want to know what is happening on Rampart Boulevard at Alta Drive; if you’re turning left from a double left-turn lane onto a three-lane street, which lane should you enter; and who is going to be allowed to drive over the Hoover Dam Bypass bridge when it is completed.

A reader asks (not too politely I might add): I’m so sick and tired of construction on Rampart. It seems like every few months they have to come back and do something else. What the $#*& is being done now?

A few months back it was a project by Las Vegas. This time it’s the Las Vegas Valley Water District.

The district is installing 1,500 feet of new 36-inch water main along Rampart Boulevard near Alta Drive.

The work began this week and is expected to finish in October.

Rampart has been reduced to two lanes in each direction at Alta.

Joe Cross asks: Could you explain what the law — if there is one — says about which lanes vehicles can use when they go from double left-turn lanes to a three-lane street? Over the past couple of months I’ve seen three drivers in the inside lane attempt to turn into the middle lane and nearly cause crashes.

Well, state law does not clearly address this issue.

The closest law that comes to answering your question is NRS 484.333, section 2, which states that when the intersecting highways are two-directional, the approach to make the left turn must be made from just right of the centerline and “after entering the intersection, the left turn must be made so as to leave the intersection to the right of the centerline of the highway being entered.”

Basically that means if you are turning left onto a two-way street you should end up just to the right of the centerline. And that would include streets with multiple lanes.

State law does not address the multiple left-lane issue as far as I can find.

I have spoken to law enforcement officers about the issue, and their interpretation of the law suggests using common sense.

In other words, a driver in the right of two left-turn lanes, who is turning left onto a roadway with multiple lanes, should turn into the right lane of a two-lane roadway and into the center lane of a three-lane road.

Following that logic, a driver in the left of two left-turn lanes, who is turning left into a roadway with multiple lanes, should turn into the left lane of a two-lane or a three-lane roadway.

Unfortunately, logic and common sense do sometimes escapes the minds of valley motorists.

Douglas G. Petermann asks: Will the Hoover Dam bypass be limited to use by trucks? Will cars no longer be allowed to use the road over the dam? Will it simply be an alternative to the road over the dam, available to anyone to use except trucks? Are there any other restrictions that will be in place for either road once the bypass opens?

Here’s the plan: Once the 1,905-foot bridge is completed — not until summer 2010 — it will provide four lanes for the U.S. Highway 93 traffic that currently uses the two-lane road over the dam. Truck traffic was banned from the dam just after the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks. (Currently, more than 2,000 trucks detour the dam via U.S. Highway 95 to a river crossing in Laughlin).

Once completed, about 17,000 cars and trucks are expected to use the new bridge on a daily basis.

And public traffic will not be allowed to pass over Hoover Dam, though you can still go and visit the marvel.

Completion of the $240 million bridge was supposed to be done by the end of 2008. But in September 2006, a crane collapse delayed construction of the concrete arch bridge project.

Federal officials originally speculated the collapse was caused by 55 mph winds, but that was incorrect, and human error was to blame.

The new structure will be named the Mike O’Callaghan-Pat Tillman Memorial Bridge. O’Callaghan was a two-term governor of Nevada, and Tillman was an Arizona Cardinals football player who joined the military after the 2001 attacks and was killed accidentally by fellow U.S. soldiers in Afghanistan.

If you have a question, tip or tirade, call the Road Warrior at 702-387-2904, or e-mail him at roadwarrior@reviewjournal.com. Please include your phone number.